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8 Powerful Habits To Create During Vacations

One of the best things you can do during vacations, especially in the mornings, is cycling. Not only does it boost you with motivation for the entire day, but it also helps you clear your head. Cycling is easy, not very straining on your body, and it is a great way to increase your health and stamina. So tomorrow morning, take your friends with you and go on a ride. Go on. It’ll be fun, I promise.

Read a book you never thought you would.

I emphasise on the second part of the heading. It’s easy to read a book that you know you’re gonna read because you’ve already made up your mind about it. I don’t want you to read the book you bought for your birthday, or the new book release from Hank Green, An Absolutely Remarkable Thing (although you should buy it- it’s great), or the book you’ve been wanting to read for ages. Save those for later, honey.

I want you to pick up a book from the back of your bookshelf, one that you never knew existed, or one that you simply forgot about, sit down, and read it. I want you to do this because it will open your mind to new ways to excite itself. And this applies for most things in life, not just books. By constantly finding new things that you love, you are stepping outside of your comfort zone and learning to enjoy new, completely different things in life.

Write.

Great, you’ve read a book. Now, it’s time for you to write! It doesn’t need to be really good (*cough* like this one *cough*), or properly structured. It doesn’t even need to make sense at first. All you need to do is put your thoughts out of your mind and onto paper. The more you do this, the easier it will become. This site is an example of that.

If you start to write consistently, you’ll start to notice that you’re able to think more clearly. The more you become comfortable with writing down your thoughts, the more you become comfortable with your thoughts.

Cool, eh?

Meditate.

I can almost see my friends cringing badly as they read that word. We millennials seem to hate the idea of meditating so much, but I just don’t know why. Maybe it’s because we are so used to running around doing stuff (basically just running around in circles), and we’re kinda afraid of stopping. And I totally get that.

If you can, and you honestly should, take 2 minutes out of your schedule in the morning and just breathe. If you’re drowned by your own thoughts, accept them all and continue breathing. Some great mobile apps for meditation are:

Manage your time.

Oh my god, I cannot even EXPLAIN how much time management helps you organize your life. The moment you set your priorities right and schedule everything properly, life becomes 10 times clearer. But I’m not a time-management expert. Creating a schedule that’s right for you takes lots of time and effort getting to know yourself better.

In order to properly manage time, you need to understand what uses up most of your time in the first place. Then, you need to get rid of the stuff that’s a pure waste of your time. That’s half the job done. The other half is to do the things that matter the most to you and doing them with full commitment, in the time that you have. And if you ever don’t have enough time to do the things that you want to, then make the time for them.

There’s always time.

Learn a new language.

I might have said this earlier, but I’m going to say it again. Learning a new language is the best way to use your free time. I mean it when I say that. I’ve been learning Spanish on Duolingo for more than a year now, and the experience has been extremely gratifying. There’s something very rewarding in putting a little bit of effort every day into learning something, which, over time, becomes a skill that’s stronger than you ever could imagine. The bottom line is this: learning a new language is an investment that lasts for a lifetime, and you should definitely get into it.

Socialize. With the right people.

ok, coming from an introvert, that word just sounds WRONG in my head, but I gotta admit, the experience of meeting strangers is worth it. But only if the strangers are a valuable addition to your life. Over time, such strangers become your closest and most loyal friends, who genuinely care and hope for the best for you. It’s an equally exhilarating experience to make friends with people who you never expected to be friends with.

So, to my fellow introverted friends, I encourage you to take a risk, step way outside of your comfort zone, and just go make a few new friends today. I’m going to go do that right now.

Just go make a few new friends today.

Brush your teeth twice a day.

Yeah, well, I don’t really mean just that. I mean “keep yourself well groomed and reasonably hygienic.” It’s fine if you don’t bathe sometimes. I mean, it’s the vacations! Who’s got the time or interest to bathe?! Still, you probably should love yourself enough to care about your own wellbeing. The best way to take care of yourself is by making the tasks automated. And the best way to make tasks automated is to do them first thing in the morning or last thing before sleeping. That’s how most tasks work (eg: brushing).

So, starting tomorrow, create one new self-care habit for the morning, and one for the night. It can be anything from applying moisturizing lotion on your skin to combing your hair. It doesn’t matter, as long as you do it with love (omg, so cheesy) and do it consistently.